


The Secrets That You Keep

by Shi_Toyu



Series: Shi's Tony Stark Bingo 2018 Fills [4]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, BAMF Tony Stark, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Has Issues, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Bucky Barnes's Metal Arm, Communication, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, No character bashing, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Protective Steve Rogers, Secret Identity, Secrets, Talking, Tony Being Tony, Tony Stark Angst, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony rambling, Tony-centric, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-15 21:38:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15422121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shi_Toyu/pseuds/Shi_Toyu
Summary: One week ago, Captain America and the Winter Soldier left a broken Iron Man in a Siberian HYDRA bunker... Now they're standing in Tony Stark's living room with no idea he's the man they left behind.





	The Secrets That You Keep

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MassiveSpaceWren](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MassiveSpaceWren/gifts).



> For the lovely MassiveSpaceWren! This is the first of her TWO 10k commissions. How I love thee, my dear!
> 
> Special thanks to Skye_wyr, Charmedlily, SyoshoHaitaki, and deathsweetqueen for some absolutely incredible beta work!
> 
> This serves as my Tony Stark Bingo fill for A5.

The look on Steve’s face was pained, perfectly mirroring the pain in Tony’s heart.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, and he sounded like he meant it. “I didn’t know where else to go.”

It wasn’t the apology Tony wanted.

But that was only to be expected. It’d been just over a week since Iron Man and Captain America’s fight in that Siberian bunker over the Winter Soldier, and all of Tony’s injuries were safely hidden beneath long sleeves and jeans. He supposed he should be grateful Steve didn’t hit Iron Man in the face too much or they would’ve been having a very different conversation right now.

He wanted to tell Steve to shove it, to take his sanctimonious ass and the rest of the ex-Avengers and get the fuck away from him. If they’d shown up any sooner, he probably would have. But… Tony could have reacted better in that bunker. And Steve didn’t _know_ he and Iron Man were the same person. Maybe… Maybe Steve would tell him about his parents. Maybe Steve would make that choice. This time.

“Why me?” he asked, looking around at the ex-Avengers, the people who had betrayed him, but now filled the living room of his mansion. He carefully did not let his eyes linger on the man he now knew killed his parents. “Why was I even an option in the first place?”

Because Tony Stark had nothing to do with the Avengers Initiative. He wasn’t affiliated with Iron Man. He’d been very careful about that. He’d already been targeted once for his weapons. He didn’t have any interest in it happening again. As far as anyone was concerned, Iron Man was a robot that’d just sort of shown up one day. No one knew who made him, not for certain, though he was considered the single most advanced artificial intelligence in the world. The popular theory, one pushed forth by Tony himself when he’d been called upon by multiple sources to consult, was that Iron Man was a learning AI created many years ago who had since developed far beyond his original programming. Tony had also taken the necessary steps to leave a trail indicating that Howard had very likely been his creator. That might make all the difference if he needed to stake a claim on the technology at some point.

Tony Stark was just the eccentric ex-CEO, still-owner of Stark Industries, who’d taken a step back from the business and his wild social life after a three-month kidnapping incident. He’d gone to great lengths to make sure that the arc reactor wasn’t discovered and had, thanks to a reunion with his old flame Maya Hansen, since removed the reactor completely. There was nothing left to tie him to Iron Man. Not when the lab where he worked on the suit was buried far beneath the city, accessible through New York’s subway system or a hidden passage in his garage. The armor was down there now, actually, patiently awaiting the moment when Tony would finally be able to stand to work on it again.

“Actually,” Sam said, stepping forward after a brief but awkward moment of silence, “I was the one who suggested it.”

Tony frowned at him.

“You’re Falcon, right? Fuck, you guys are all wanted fugitives, aren’t you?”

He let a tone of panic creep into his voice, acting like the realization was only just hitting him. It was easier than he cared to admit, helped along by Clint shifting uneasily in his peripheral vision. His skin crawled under Natasha’s gaze.

“It’s okay,” Steve tried to tell him, which was so absurd Tony wanted to laugh. Steve had no idea just how _not okay_ this was. “Sam suggested it, but I was the one who made the call. We met at Peggy’s funeral, do you remember?”

Like it hadn’t been just a week and a half before. Like Tony hadn’t given the Iron Man armor over to JARVIS’ control so he could attend the funeral of his godmother while Iron Man attended the Accords signing. Some things were just more important.

“Of course.”

“You said she always told you stories about me when you were growing up, stories about the adventures she and I would get up to. About the Howling Commandoes and Bucky Barnes.”

Tony’s eyes stung. He’d had no idea at the time that Steve would soon betray him. He would never have revealed something so intimate if he’d known. He hadn’t known Barnes had killed his parents, or that the assassin was about to be framed for bombing the UN. He’d… He’d hoped Steve might turn to Tony Stark for help finding his long-lost friend. He wanted to know if he and Steve could be friends, or at least friendly, not just as Captain America and Iron Man.

“Lots of kids were raised on bedtime stories of Captain America,” he hedged.

He had a feeling where this was going, and he didn’t much like it. Still, knowing something was a bad idea had never stopped him before.

”None of them were Howard’s son.”

This was it. Maybe this was the moment Steve told him the truth. Maybe Steve would tell Howard’s _son_ what he’d deemed beneath the notice of Howard’s _creation._ (Not that there was a difference.)

“My old man spoke well of you, too. But I’m pretty sure you weren’t an international criminal when he knew you.”

Because Tony wasn’t above twisting the knife, for all his hope. Truthfully, he almost couldn’t help himself, the words slipping out before he even really thought about them. Steve scowled at him, that disapproving look that spoke of disappointment and unmet expectations.

“We aren’t criminals. We were doing what was _right._ ”

Not the moment, then. But it could still come. Tony had to believe that. Steve was a _good_ man.

“And Iron Man?” Tony challenged, because a civilian wouldn’t know the answer. “The news says he disappeared while pursuing you. There are people saying you killed him.”

Steve flinched, as did Barnes. Natasha’s sharp gaze snapped over to them and Tony would absolutely admit it was a relief to have that gaze off of himself, even momentarily.

“Iron Man is a machine, not a person,” Steve bit out. Scott Lang, Ant-Man, was eyeing him now, too. “His programming… I didn’t have a choice. He’ll be fine. Once things have calmed down, we’ll be able to go back for the armor and get him back online.”

Tony tried very, very hard not to let the maelstrom of emotions he was feeling show on his face. That was…

“Funny that you still call a machine ‘he’,” was all he could manage.

Wherever Thor was, Tony sent up a silent prayer that Natasha’s focus still seemed to be on Steve. He wasn’t willing to bet his masks against her eyes, at least not the metaphorical ones.

“That’s not the point right now,” Steve snapped, looking irritated. Apparently Iron Man was a sore spot. Good. Captain America had left plenty of sore spots on Tony, too. “We need your help. Bucky’s arm was damaged in the fight. Howard was a brilliant man, and I knew I could trust him. Please, Tony.”

Tony looked around the room. Scott Lang was the only one he hadn’t met before, not including the fight at the airport. All of the others… He’d fought alongside them. He’d put his life on the line to keep them safe and had put his own life in their hands. He’d thought he could trust them and they’d all turned their backs as soon as he disagreed. They hadn’t even tried to _talk_.

“So, you came to use me, in the end,” he murmured quietly. The pain of the realization ached instead of stung, like an old wound. But of course it would. He’d been expecting it, after all, hadn’t he? From the moment he’d walked into the room and realized they weren’t here because they’d figured out his secret identity. “Figures.”

A flash of anger crossed Steve’s face and Tony could barely keep himself from flinching away. Like this? Without the suit? Steve could kill him in seconds. It wasn’t Steve who spoke, though. It was Barnes.

“He’s right,” his gravelly voice cut through the room despite its low volume. “He doesn’t deserve this, Stevie, to have all this just thrust on him. I’m _fine_ , we can just… figure something out.”

Which was blatantly untrue. Tony knew the kind of damage he, Iron Man, had done to Barnes. The arm wasn’t just damaged, it was gone. He’d blasted it off with a repulsor while the man was trying to rip the arc reactor right out of his chest. Even if the arm was just wired into his pressure relays, which it would have to be in order for it not to crush any weapon Barnes tried to pick up, it had to be causing him a huge amount of discomfort.

A little voice in the back of Tony’s head that sounded suspiciously like Yinsen told Tony that he should probably feel bad about that. And he did. Technically. In the end, Barnes wasn’t the one Tony was mad at. He couldn’t blame Barnes for what happened while he was under Hydra’s control any more than he could blame Clint for his actions during Loki’s invasion. Or Bruce being sent after that city when the Scarlet Bitch got into Hulk’s head. Thank fuck she’d been locked up in the bowels of some secret facility right after Ultron. She deserved to rot, as far as Tony was concerned.

No, Steve was the one Tony was really mad at. If he had just _told_ Tony back after the fall of SHIELD about the Winter Soldier killing his parents… But, of course, Steve hadn’t _known_ Tony back then, not as anything other than someone he heard about every so often on the news. They’d never met, never spoken. Considering the briefing SHIELD probably gave Steve after defrosting him about possible living kin of the people he’d known before, Steve probably hadn’t had any desire to meet Tony. He still wasn’t making the best impressions back then, too busy trying to quietly clean house to be concerned about what the media was saying about him.

And Iron Man. Well, Steve had been among those thinking Howard had been Iron Man’s original creator, Tony was pretty sure. He’d even asked Iron Man about it one time, though the answer he’d gotten had been noncommittal. It was reasonable to think Iron Man didn’t have any strong attachment to his creator, Tony supposed. Zemo had certainly thought he would, though, and he’d been right. He just had no idea the reaction had more to do with Maria Stark than Howard.

“Now, now,” he jumped in before Steve could launch into some rousing speech about Barnes’ self-worth or other such nonsense, “that wasn’t a _no._ If I said no to everyone who’d ever tried to use me in my life, I’d probably be starving on the streets by now. No, the key to letting people use you, you see, is to use them right back.”

Steve made an affronted kind of noise, but Natasha and Clint both looked somewhat… approving. It was weird and Tony didn’t like it. He focused on Barnes instead.

“Your arm is some kind of revolutionary old Russian prosthetic, right? Nobody on the news can quite agree, but that seems to be the consensus on what little information they’re actually letting out.”

Grey-blue eyes met his own and Tony felt his breath catch. They looked so tired, exhausted really. Not just physical exhaustion, either, but the kind of bone deep ache that came with having nothing left to give. Barnes was done, physically and emotionally. Worse, Tony knew that look. He’d seen it in the mirror too many times to mistake it for anything else. Dammit. Just fuck his life. He did _not_ need to be identifying with the man who’d killed his parents. Fuck. That.

“Russian, yeah,” Barnes allowed. “What of it?”

“I want it,” Tony informed him cheerfully, not allowing himself to focus on what he’d seen in the other man’s gaze. Emotions were like gas, they’d pass eventually. “The arm, I mean. Assuming you still have it? It’s obviously not still attached, but please tell me you didn’t lose it somewhere.”

“You can’t have his _arm_ ,” Steve hissed, scandalized. “You have to reattach it!”

Tony scoffed.

“You’re kidding, right? I can tell from here that shoulder joint is fucked. Seriously, did you rip it off or get run over by a tank? Because those are the two options I’m seeing here.” He ignored Barnes’ grimace and continued on, “I may be a genius, but there’s a limit to what even I can do. I’m gonna need the arm in the first place just to figure out how everything works and then probably remove some extra before attaching a new one.”

“We have the arm,” Barnes spoke again, “and it’s yours if you want it. But if you’re really signing on for this, I’d appreciate it if you could start with the wiring still left in my shoulder. It’s still pinging my nerves.”

Tony froze.

“ _What?_ ”

“The pain receptors,” Barnes expounded. “I don’t know how to shut them off.”

“You…” Tony felt himself sway on his feet, mind reeling. “Your arm is _gone_.”

Barnes’ look was dryer than the Sahara.

“How observant of you,” he grit out through clenched teeth.

Tony’s pretty sure he made an inarticulate noise of horror as he stuttered a step forward.

“How are you not in shock?”

His voice sounded shrill and panicked even to his own ears and the tension in the room went through the roof as everyone else reacted instinctively. He couldn’t focus on that, though. Couldn’t even _process_ it.

Barnes had been living for a week feeling like his arm had been ripped off, leaving behind a gaping wound. With the super soldier serum, he probably couldn’t even take any pain killers. Tony had to choke back bile as memories of waking up in a cave with a hole carved into his chest rose up in Tony’s mind and threatened to overwhelm him.

Nope.

Absolutely not.

Tony was not letting this go on.

“You should probably come with me to my workshop. Like, right now. Before you faint or, more likely, _I_ do.”

.

Poking around the exposed wires of Barnes’ shoulder was an experience Tony would really have liked to be able to wipe from his memory completely. Barnes hid it remarkably well, but Tony was in his space far enough to note the way his muscles jumped and twitched every time the cables so much as brushed against something. Which, considering Tony was actively examining and messing with that entire area, was sickeningly often.

Tony _had_ managed to figure out the relays enough to detach several of the cables, though, as well as turning off sensation to the rest. Barnes didn’t even try to disguise the way he went near-boneless and collapsed with relief as soon as Tony managed it. He all but melted into the cushions of couch Pepper had ordered for Tony’s workshop. They’d ended up there by virtue of it either being that or Bucky laying on his back atop one of Tony’s cleared workbenches. Tony had gone a bit green around the gills at the thought. Even just the mental image was too close to a body laid out in a morgue for his liking.

All that was done with, though. Barnes splayed across Tony’s couch, head tipped back and legs sprawled out in front of him. There was sweat on his brow and his eyes were closed. He looked like he could drop off to sleep at any second, or maybe like he already was, but a small smile decorated his lips.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Barnes groaned out in a tone that was just obscene. “That’s good.”

Tony gathered his tools and stood, taking them to put away. He didn’t want to stay around Barnes any longer than he had to.

“Do you want me to get one of the others for you?” he offered. “I know you said you didn’t want them in here for this, but since it’s over now…”

Barnes just flopped his flesh hand against the couch in a noncommittal gesture.

“In a minute,” he said, _sounding_ half-asleep now. “I just… I need a moment to enjoy this.”

The guilt deep in the pit of Tony’s stomach curled tighter, but he shoved the sensation aside.

“Right, well, just let me know.”

Barnes hummed his acknowledgement and several long minutes passed of, to Tony at least, uncomfortable silence as he finished putting away his tools. It wasn’t until he was situated behind his desk once more, pulling up an SI project to keep his hand and mind occupied, that Barnes spoke up again.

“Hey,” he called to get Tony’s attention. He waited until Tony was looking at him to continue. He’d pulled himself up to sit with his elbow on one knee, still smiling that small little smile. “Thank you.”

He sounded like he meant it and Tony barely managed to resist flinching. His pain had been Tony’s fault. He shouldn’t thank the man who’d stabbed him for pulling the knife back out. That was just… no.

Tony waved the comment off, covering his discomfort with obnoxious flippancy. It’d always worked well enough for him in the past.

“Don’t mention it,” he said, meaning it more than Barnes could ever know. “You should never have had to go that long in that kind of pain in the first place.”

Barnes grimaced.

“Considering the things I’ve done, there are probably a lot of people who would say I deserve plenty more than that.”

Tony gave him a long look, using the time to remind himself that Tony Stark wouldn’t know all of the things that Iron Man knew.

“The news said you were framed for the bombing, though.”

Barnes made a noncommittal noise.

“Even if I had, it wouldn’t have been the worst of my crimes.”

Tony knew he should take the opportunity to comfort him. PTSD was familiar enough to him by now to recognize when someone else probably had it, too. Hell, if Barnes didn’t have PTSD from all the trauma he’d been through, Tony would eat the Iron Man helmet. There was probably trauma and guilt and all sorts of things Tony didn’t want to deal with wrapped up in Barnes’ head. He felt for the guy, more than he cared to admit, but that didn’t mean _he_ was signing up to be his shoulder to cry on. Tony would fix his arm, make up for his own mistakes, but he wasn’t getting any more involved than that.

“Right,” he said awkwardly. “Well, I’ll just get started on designing that new arm for you, shall I?”

He turned away quickly, not wanting to face the man.

“Wait,” Barnes called out. “Look, I… There’s something you need to know before you get started.”

Tony stilled, but stayed facing the opposite direction. Barnes’ tone was all he needed to know he wasn’t talking about something to do with the arm. He had a terrible feeling he knew what was to come.

“About the arm?”

Barnes grimaced.

“No. About… me, the Winter Soldier. What I did. You deserve to know, so you can still change your mind if you want to, which I wouldn’t blame you for. There was a mission I was sent on, back in the late 80’s. It involved your par-“

“ _Stop_ ,” Tony cut him off, hand thrown out as if to physically stop him from continuing. His heart pounded in his chest. Fear clawed at him, panic rising. “I don’t want to know,” he rasped.

Barnes fidgeted.

“You deserve to,” he insisted. “You should be fully informed before you make your choice. You deserve to know who you’re doing this for.”

“I’m doing this for _me_ ,” Tony snarled, falling back on his age-old defense mechanism of substituting aggression for vulnerability. “And I don’t want to hear whatever it is you have to say, okay? I don’t want to hear it from you.”

Barnes stared at him for a long moment before nodding jerkily.

“Okay,” he gave in. “Okay. That’s… That’s your choice, too. Just, I’m sorry. Even if you don’t want to know what for, I’m sorry.”

Tony scowled down at his workbench, refusing to look at the super soldier. Several minutes passed in silence before Barnes seemed to finally get the message and stood.

“I’ll have Sam bring by the arm,” he said, and headed for the door.

.

Tony did his level best to make sure he didn’t have to interact with the ex-Avengers any more than absolutely necessary. JARVIS monitored them, which helped immensely. But since he was also trying to keep JARVIS’s presence more or less on the down low, the AI wasn’t always able to _warn_ him. At least it seemed like some of the ex-Avengers he wanted to avoid the most had just as little interest in interacting with _him._ Steve, for example, hadn’t spoken a word to him in the three days since their little ragtag group had arrived. He was practically glued to Barnes’ side and that was somewhere Tony was staying far away from.

He had all the scans and measurements he needed in order to craft Barnes a new arm, though he did wish Bruce was still around to help him out with the biological side of things. He’d make do without, though. Tony had become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics overnight. The neurobiology involved in connecting circuitry to the nervous system would be no problem at all. If making amends for his own mistakes weren’t enough (and Tony still felt physically ill at the thought of how much pain Barnes had been in for an entire _week_ ) then he still had plenty of motivation from SI.

He’d already sent the blueprints for a variety of improved limb braces off to Pepper’s desk, designed for Rhodey and his now-useless legs. Those had been easy enough, based on the structural supports in the Iron Man armor and the ‘reverse engineered’ War Machine. With the technology of Barnes’ arm and the way Hydra had hardwired it into his system, Tony would hopefully be able to figure out a way to bring sensation back to anyone in need of a prosthetic limb. Of course, based on the scans JARVIS had taken, Barnes had only survived his implants because of the serum. Tony’s biggest obstacle would be figuring out how to get the job done without killing people in the process.

Still, the possibilities were endless.

For now, though, he just needed to focus on figuring it out for Barnes. The sooner he did that, the sooner he could get them out of his house. He felt constantly on edge, having them around. His skin itched and felt too-tight. It was like there were always eyes on him and he _hated it_. Yes, he had the world’s most advanced AI (even if she was having to hide her existence at the moment) and a security system that followed his every move. Yes, he was used to having members of the media and even the general public trying to pry their way into his life at any given moment. Yes, he had grown up in front of a camera. None of that made it any easier to deal with having to exist in the same space as the people who had betrayed him and left him to die.

He lived in constant fear of being caught out, particularly by Natasha, and so, spent most of his time locked away in his garage. To be fair, he probably would’ve spent most of his time there anyway, working on the limb for Barnes, but her presence added a certain extra incentive. It didn’t help matters that his garage was rather less equipped than his hidden lab was. It’d never been a problem before, but now he was having to come up with creative ways around using equipment he normally would have ready access to, but now didn’t. The whole situation was just _so frustrating_.

Tony growled under his breath and resisted the urge to throw a screwdriver or whatever other tool was within easy reach.

“Uh, is now a bad time?”

Tony looked up in surprise, spotting Barnes easily where he was loitering near the doorway. JARVIS must not have been able to warn him for fear of Barnes overhearing it with his enhanced senses. He was perfectly still, probably a holdover from his time with Hydra, but he still had an air of nervousness about him. They hadn’t talked since Bucky’s attempted confession the day before yesterday, hadn’t even seen each other.

“No worse than any other,” Tony told him as he leaned back in his chair. He made a vague motion toward the screens in front of him. “I’m just trying to sort through all of this information to get a better idea of things. What’s up? If you’re here to check on the progress of your new arm, I can tell you it’s going to be a while.”

“Oh, no,” Barnes denied, sounding just as off-footed as he looked. “Actually, I was… I’m thinking about not getting a new one. And I was wondering what that might entail as far as,” he gestured toward the stump of his shoulder where the inner circuits were still exposed, except for the fact that Tony had taped over the whole area so it wouldn’t get wet if he showered, “all of this, sealing it off in a more permanent manner.”

That… was not something Tony had been expecting. Granted, he wouldn’t have been able to come up with anything he actually did expect, but it wasn’t for Bucky to want to forsake having an arm at all.

“Well,” he started slowly, still trying to wrap his head around it all, “that’d depend, mostly on whether or not you think you might want an arm again at some later point. Do you, uh, want to sit and we can talk about it?”

It felt awkward. So, horribly awkward, but Barnes gave a grateful little smile and headed for the couch, and Tony wheeled his chair over to join him.

“So…” he prompted, when they were both settled but Barnes hadn’t spoken again, “Do you think you might want an arm again at some point or not?”

“I don’t really know, honestly. Steve wants me to get a new one. He wants to _fix_ me. I just- The arm has always been a weapon. It was HYDRA’s weapon that they welded onto me so that I could be of more use to them. It was built for death and destruction and that’s all it ever did. Even once I was free of them… I thought it would end, but I was only fooling myself. Zemo was able to use me because of what they did and I was able to cause all that damage because of the arm they gave me. And Iron Man, he-“

He had to stop for a moment to take a deep breath. Tony noted with no small amount of shock that his hand was shaking.

“I know that the arm you make wouldn’t be the same, but it would still make me that much more capable of hurting someone again. Not having one wouldn’t stop me, but it would at least give them more of a chance. I don’t-“ he choked on his words and Tony was absolutely horrified to realize that honest-to-God tears were gathering in his eyes, “I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore. I don’t want to _fight_ anymore!”

“Okay, okay!” Tony rushed to reassure him, panic thrumming through his chest. He was so not qualified to handle crying super soldiers. Not at _all_. This was _not_ in his job description! “That’s alright. You, uh, don’t have to decide right away. I can make a housing unit to cover your shoulder that will be capable of connecting to a prosthetic, but you don’t have to get one if you don’t want to. That is definitely, absolutely, totally your choice. It might be better, actually, in the long run. You’d be able to detach the arm for any updates for maintenance that needed to be done so you wouldn’t have to sit down in the lab with whomever was doing the fixing.”

Bucky was still looking terrifyingly teary-eyed, and Tony just went ahead and turned over all control to his mouth to run anywhere it liked, as long as he didn’t have to touch those emotions with a hundred-foot pole.

“As for the rest of it, there are things that can be done. I’ve actually got another project for SI that could be useful. I don’t really know what all Hydra did to you, but it was some form of brainwashing, right? The BARF system was technically developed for things like PTSD, but it’s theoretically possible that it could be used in conjunction with other therapy methods to counteract the brainwashing they used on you. I mean, you’d want to consult an actual professional first, obviously. Specifically, a professional in psychology, since I’m technically a professional by this isn’t really my area of expertise. It’s kind of like when I tell Pepper I’m cleared to do work on doctor’s orders, but _I’m_ the doctor. So, yeah. Psychologist, psychiatrist, psychotherapist. Whatever floats your boat. You’d want to do that anyway.

“Have you, by the way? Talked to a professional? I mean, I know you’ve been on the run and in hiding, but it would theoretically be possible. Does doctor-patient confidentiality extend to if you’re wanted by the police? Where does that stand in terms of the law? I honestly don’t know. I guess Sam would count as a professional, since he used to work at the VA and all that, but I’m not sure you’re supposed to go to people you know in your personal life? I think I read that somewhere. It makes sense, I guess. They’d be biased from knowing you and more about the situation, but then again, they might also have a better read on you because they know you. Who knows, really? I certainly don’t. I’ve never had any patience for the squishy sciences, you know what I mean?”

Bless all that was Holy, Barnes gave a chuckle. A wet chuckle, but Tony would take it.

“You’re something else, Stark… Has anyone ever told you that?”

Tony grinned at him, extra wide and relieved.

“That depends. Do you mean it in a good way or a bad way?”

Barnes wiped a hand over his face and inhaled deeply.

“Definitely a good way. Thank you.”

“Hey, don’t mention it. As long as I still get to keep the old arm, we can call it even. That thing is _fascinating_.”

“Yeah, alright,” he allowed with a grin. “It’s all yours. Trust me, Stark, I don’t want it.”

Tony looked at him for a long moment. A week ago, he’d hated Barnes. Just a few days ago, though, Barnes had been the only member of the little ex-Avengers group who tried to tell Tony the truth. Even now, none of the others had bothered. Tony wasn’t sure if anyone else but Barnes and Steve _knew_ , though. If Cap hadn’t bothered to tell Iron Man, would he tell the others? Even after all that’d happened? Tony didn’t know anymore.

“Call me Tony.”

Barnes chanced another little smile.

“Call me Bucky, then. D’you mind telling me a bit more about this BARF thing?”

.

Even shelving the process of having to build a new arm as quickly as possible, Tony had his work cut out for him. People seemed to think that, if it had anything at all to do with science, it came effortlessly to him. And, granted, it was probably easier for him than it would be for most people. The truth of the matter, though, was that it wasn’t easy at all. Tony put a lot of work into his creations. _That_ was how he was able to create such amazing and wondrous things.

For him, learning a whole new branch of science wasn’t unheard of, but it was still a hell of a lot of work. He was surviving almost purely on caffeine at this point, a headache pounding behind his eyes. He was pretty sure he should stop and get some sleep, come back fresh, but he was in a zone. He could all but feel the answers he was reaching for just out of his grasp. If he could just push himself a little bit more…

“Tony, hey, can you hear me?”

Tony nearly jumped out of his skin at the soft voice in his ear and the warm hand on his shoulder. He blinked bleary eyes upwards until Bucky’s concerned face came into focus.

“Yeah, hey, hi,” he greeted. “What is it?”

Bucky frowned down at him, his brows knitting together in a way that was undeniably cute. Objectively speaking. Certainly not practically speaking. Tony definitely didn’t think Bucky was cute with any sort of intention behind it. He was so far off-limits, for a whole laundry list of reasons, that it wasn’t even funny. Not the least of which was that Tony didn’t need a relationship complicating his life right now. Things were difficult enough as they were.

“Are you okay?” Bucky asked, with what appeared to be real concern. “You didn’t answer when I called your name at first. You didn’t even notice me until I touched you, did you?”

“‘m fine,” Tony waved his concern aside. “Really. What did you need?”

But Bucky was still frowning at him.

“I just wanted to check in and see how you were doing. No one has seen you in a couple days, not that Steve or Nat or Clint have seen much of any of you at all since we got here.”

“I try and stay out of their way,” Tony’s mouth said with absolutely no input on his part. Now he was frowning, this time in disapproval. “Besides, I’ve been working.”

Now, Bucky’s eyebrows went up with surprise. They were very expressive eyebrows, it seemed.

“This whole time?” he asked incredulously. “It’s been three days, Tony!”

Tony was a bit taken aback by his vehemence, but whatever. Way back in the beginning, Pepper had gotten like that about his work binges, too. Actually, now that he was thinking about it, the only person who hadn’t gotten like this about them was Rhodey, and that was probably because they’d met during college and everyone was doing it. They had to in order to get their work done. Even Obie had urged Tony to take more breaks to rest and eat over the years.

It really shouldn’t be all that surprising that Bucky would react that way, too. He seemed like a decent person. More than that, even. He was a _good_ person. Hell, he’d spent his formative years running after and taking care of a pre-serum Steve Rogers. Worrying about people was probably his default setting.

Feeling a bit awkward, Tony just shrugged.

“I have a lot to do,” he said, by way of explanation.

It was true. Tony wanted to get this procedure done as soon as possible, but he still had to get his projects done for Stark Industries, or Pepper would figure out something was going on and pester him until he told her exactly what it was. If she found out the ex-Avengers were here… Well, it wouldn’t be pretty, at the very least, and Tony really wasn’t feeling up to having to call someone to clean Captain America’s blood out of his carpet.

So there was that.

Bucky didn’t look any less concerned, but there was a bit of a dubious gleam to his eye. It was almost as if he didn’t believe Tony’s workload justified his current state of disarray. Ridiculous.

“You know it’s okay if this takes a while, right? I mean, there’s no rush on my account. I’m fine.”

“The sooner I get it done, the sooner I get all of you out of my house,” Tony replied, realizing only when Bucky flinched that it might have sounded a bit harsher than he intended. Didn’t make it any less true, though. “It’s just a big risk for me,” he tried to soften the blow, “harboring fugitives and all.”

“Right. Of course.”

Bucky’s expression had taken on a distinctly blank quality, a little too much like the Winter Soldier’s when he’d been tearing through personnel at the Joint Counter Terrorism Centre facility for Tony’s comfort. Fuck, but this whole situation was so messed up. Tony almost wished the concern would come back. Anything but this careful lack of emotion. Bucky should never have to look like this again.

“Do you want to order a pizza?” he blurted out, pleased when Bucky’s surprise at the non sequitur caused his mask to crack just a bit. “I just haven’t eaten in a while and it suddenly occurs to me that you may not have had pizza, given that you were a brainwashed murderbot and then on the run. I mean, maybe you have, but my place fries the chicken for their BBQ pizza and caramelizes their bacon in a balsamic reduction. Or there’s another one with spinach and ricotta and sliced meatballs. So, pizza?”

The corner of Bucky’s mouth twitched upward in a hint of a smile.

“Yeah, okay,” he gave in, making Tony beam at him. “I can order some pizza. Do have the number somewhere?”

“Oh, uh,” Tony hesitated just a moment before deciding to go for it. He leaned in just a bit. “Can you keep a secret?”

“What kind of secret?” Bucky asked, and Tony was suddenly intimately aware of just how many secrets there were between all of them. Wasn’t that how they’d gotten here in the first place? Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea, after all, but he had already come this far and he was too tired to turn back now.

Fuck it.

“JARVIS?” Tony asked, while maintaining eye contact with Bucky. “Be a dear and put in an order for us, would you? To be delivered here to the workshop. Make sure it’s one of the kids I like that brings it in.”

“Of course, Sir,” JARVIS demurred from above, and then it was Bucky’s turn to startle. “Sergeant Barnes, do you have a preferred drink for me to include in the order?”

“Uh…” Bucky didn’t seem to quite know how to react. “Coke? I’ve had one of those before. It’s a lot different than it used to be, but still pretty good.”

“Very good. The order should arrive in approximately thirty-eight minutes.”

Bucky turned wide-eyes to Tony.

“What was _that?_ ”

Tony couldn’t help but grin. He always did love people’s reactions to JARVIS, as rarely as he allowed anyone to find out about the AI.

“That,” he replied with no small amount of smug pride, “is JARVIS, a learning AI. He’s an artificial intelligence, built to experience and adapt. He runs the place, really, and pretty much every aspect of my life that Pepper doesn’t. Pepper is my CEO, by the way. Used to be my PA, but then I gave her the company when I was dying, cause she was going to do a way better job with it than anyone else and then it was just really nice not to have to deal with all the stuff that goes along with running the company myself. I could just stay here and make stuff. Like JARVIS. Of course, I can’t tell many people about _him._ ”

Bucky, who’d moved on to staring up at the ceiling in wonder, now looked back at Tony again with a bit of confusion in his eyes.

“Why not? Is he not ready yet?”

“Ready? What, for market? JARVIS isn’t a product,” he said with steel in his voice. “He was never meant for market. JARVIS is just JARVIS.”

“Then why is he a secret?”

He seemed genuinely curious, and it was only that which kept Tony from saying something that probably would have been insulting.

“Well,” he said instead, actually putting some consideration into the answer, “at first, it was because I didn’t want the pressure of SI wanting something like him for the market, and then it just sort of became habit. These days, it’s mostly because of Iron Man.”

“Iron Man?”

“Yeah. He’s an AI, you know. At least, that’s the popular theory. Even though he’s a superhero, the fact that he exists at all has brought up all sorts of philosophical and political debates when it comes to self-aware technology. Not to mention that any AI I created would automatically associate Iron Man with Stark Industries even more than he already is. Trust me, we’ve been fighting _that_ battle since his first appearance.”

Bucky gave him a look that Tony couldn’t quite place. There was something there, lurking in the depths of Bucky’s blue-grey eyes, but Tony just didn’t know what it was.

“Because Iron Man was created by your father, right?”

His voice was gentle, almost reverent without a worshipful quality. It was like he was paying Howard his respects just by mentioning him. It wasn’t at all like the way Steve talked about his old friend, full of warmth and admiration. This was a man who very much felt the pain of having killed someone he cared about, of standing in front of that person’s son, and trying to make up for it in any way he could. But Bucky respected Tony’s desire not to know and that, more than anything else, increased the respect Tony felt for him.

“Maybe,” Tony hedged. “Probably. I don’t know if you know any of this, but I was actually the one the government, and SHIELD, called in to try and figure Iron Man out shortly after he first started appearing. They wanted to know where he’d come from, what he was after, whether or not they could trust him. People were even less sure then of whether he was a robot or just some guy in a suit. There was even a group who were convinced he was some super-advanced tech from space.

“I took a look at some of the algorithms left behind in his hacking and communication trails, as well as some of the armor scraps SHIELD had scavenged from various battles, though there wasn’t much of that. There were a lot of similarities to Howard’s work. Now, it very well could be that, as a learning AI, Iron Man learned from Howard’s techniques and methods. It would make sense, given the fact that there were very few people on this planet who could do the things he could.”

“But that’s not what you think.”

It wasn’t a question, but Tony could still hear what was being asked.

“There were a _lot_ of similarities,” Tony reiterated. “Too many for me to think there wasn’t some direct correlation between them. The most likely scenario is that my father created Iron Man’s base code and started him on a learning path decades ago, possibly even before I was born. He was likely housed on one of Howard’s private servers and was meant to stay there, exposed only to what Howard chose to expose him to. Then the internet came along and…” Tony shrugged.

“Why wait all this time before showing himself, though?” Bucky wanted to know. He wasn’t the first to have asked. “Why did no one know about him before he showed up in a metal suit and started wiping terrorists off the map? Why did he wait so long to start doing that, even, if he was around the whole time?”

Tony was already shaking his head.

“There’s a lot of evidence to suggest he _was_ around, actually. There have been unexplained hacks for decades that bear Iron Man’s tell-tale methodology and signature, in various ways. It’s quite fascinating, if you know what you’re looking for. You can almost see him grow and develop. Plus, almost all of those hacks can be traced back to activist or vigilante initiatives. He was just keeping things more under the radar then, learning and perfecting his methods. At some point, I guess he decided it wasn’t enough. Or maybe he just finally figured out how to make himself a body, the armor. I reverse-engineered the War Machine armor from it, did you know? I’m probably the only person in the world who could, though plenty of people have tried. It’s an _incredible_ piece of tech, definitely gave me a nerd boner.”

And there went his mouth, running away with him again. Tony wanted to kick himself. He did _not_ need to be talking about boners with the Winter Soldier. The man was giving him another little smile, though, so he guess it hadn’t gone over too poorly.

“That’s amazing,” Bucky praised. “You really know your stuff, huh?”

Tony shrugged.

“I would hope so. It’s sort of my job.”

It drew a chuckle from the other man, and Tony felt warmth blossom in his chest. He grew serious then, though, and his icy stare pinned Tony in place.

“There was a Hydra base in Siberia,” Bucky said, “where there were more Winter Soldiers. I thought Zemo was going to wake them up, but he killed them. Steve and I got into a fight with Iron Man, though… He was pretty badly damaged. He deactivated, or whatever it would be called. Steve destroyed the thing in his chest, the arc reactor? He says we’ll be able to get him back online, once things have calmed down, but… Do you think that’s true? Do you think he’ll be alright?”

Tony’s heart was pounding, but he found he couldn’t look away from Bucky’s gaze.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, a bit too honestly for his tastes. “That sort of thing can leave a hell of a mark, and everyone knows Captain America can do a lot of damage.”

Bucky nodded solemnly.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Yeah, he can.”

“You won’t… tell him about this, will you?” Tony asked tentatively. “I figure he’s got to be feeling the pressure with everything that’s going on with the news and all. He doesn’t need any reason to think Iron Man and I might be associated with each other.”

“No,” Bucky said, with promise in his tone. “He doesn’t need to know.”

And the funny thing was, Tony believed him.

.

It became a pretty normal occurrence, after that, for Bucky to come and join Tony in the lab. He made himself helpful too, providing Tony with as many of the scant details he could remember of what Hydra had done with the arm. Admittedly, it wasn’t much, but every little bit helped. He was pretty good for conversation too, which Tony appreciated. It’d been a depressingly long time since he’s had anyone but JARVIS to really talk to.

Despite everything, Tony found himself actually liking the guy. As if that were a good idea in any universe ever.

Sometimes Sam or Lang would join them, too. Lang had some insights that were surprisingly valuable and the two of them ended up geeking out at each other for a good half of their first visit, culminating in Lang pulling out a brag book of pictures of his daughter and talking to Tony about her for nearly a solid hour. It was clear he loved her. Tony didn’t ask why he’d chosen to leave her to become a fugitive. Steve had a way of making things make sense. Tony knew that. The sheer strength of his conviction and belief could drag just about anyone right along with him.

It took Tony close to two weeks to accomplish everything he needed in order to feel comfortable messing with what was left of Bucky’s shoulder. Ideally, he would have had Helen Cho around to actually handle the fleshy part of this whole dog and pony show, but that wasn’t an option. Tony couldn’t bring in anyone from the outside. The more people who were involved, the more likely it would be that word of the ex-Avengers’ presence would get out. Not that Tony didn’t trust Helen. Of course he did, but it wouldn’t be fair to put her in that kind of situation, to force her to choose between her legal obligations and her friends.

Instead, Tony asked Bucky to come to his lab and walked him through the entire process of how this all would go. Tony would need to strip and rewire the ports currently set up in Bucky’s shoulder, file down, remove and replace some of the pieces that had been damaged in their fight in the bunker in Siberia, and then attach a cap over the whole housing that would keep it safe and clean in case Bucky ever decided to have another arm attached.

“It’d probably be best for you to be unconscious for the bulk of the procedure,” he informed Bucky. “There isn’t really a way that I can make it painless when I’m having to get that up close and personal with your system. I understand if that makes you uncomfortable, all things considered. Is there someone you might want here with you? Or would that make it worse?”

Bucky seemed to genuinely consider his options.

“Would you be okay with Steve being here?” he finally asked, seeming genuinely hesitant.

Which didn’t make any sense at all. Why would Tony Stark have a problem with Steve Rogers? Bucky had probably just noticed the way he was avoiding most of the team, Steve included.

“Sure,” he agreed, injecting as much false enthusiasm into his tone as he could muster. “I was kind of thinking that might be who you chose, anyway. What with the two of you being such long-lost best friends and all. Due warning, the whole thing might be a bit boring for him, but it’s all about making you feel more comfortable.”

Bucky nodded along, but he still frowned unhappily.

“Steve’s always had my back,” he said, as if trying to explain his choice.

Tony didn’t understand why he felt the need to. Tony understood. If he were in Bucky’s place, there’d be no one he’d rather have there than Rhodey or Pepper. Tony could get over his discomfort (not fear, it definitely wasn’t fear) in Steve’s presence if it meant Bucky could relax a bit more about the procedure. Besides, Steve still didn’t know he was Iron Man. How could he? And as long as he didn’t know, there was no reason for him to react badly toward Tony Stark.

“Welp,” Tony said, clapping his hands sharply, “Let’s plan on tomorrow, then, shall we? I don’t know about you, but I’d like to get this over and done with.”

.

Having Steve down in the lab with them was every bit as awkward as Tony had predicted it would be. In true Steve fashion, he was a bundle of concern and worry. He hovered just over Tony’s shoulder, trying to get a clear look at what was being done to his friend despite the fact that he couldn’t possibly know what was really going on even if he _could_ get a good look. The hairs on the back of Tony’s neck stood on end, his hindbrain constantly itching from having his back turned toward danger. Tony kept having to catch himself from turning around to keep Steve in his line of sight.

Somehow, insanely, it occurred to Tony that he might actually feel better about the whole thing if Bucky were actually awake. As crazy as it seemed, he and Bucky had built up a rapport over the past few weeks. He felt secure with the other man, even if Bucky _had_ killed his parents. He felt safe. He did not feel safe with Steve. He didn’t think Steve would do anything, really, but his hindbrain didn’t seem to have totally bought into that. Whatever. Tony had been dealing with his own anxieties for years. This really wasn’t any different.

He mentally shunted Steve from his mind and concentrated on the task at hand instead. It was delicate work; beyond delicate. Tony was using a screen to operate tiny nanobots injected into Bucky’s shoulder to do the work that needed to be done inside. It was the least invasive method he’d been able to think of. As soon as the procedure was over, he could deactivate the nanobots and they’d work their way out of Bucky’s body naturally. Any work on the exposed portions of the joint, Tony would do by hand.

It was exhausting work, requiring hyper-focused attention on every minute detail. One slipped hand or wrong command could leave Bucky with lasting damage, especially where the work with his nervous system was concerned. Hell, Tony was messing with things hardwired into his _spine_ and _brain_. Bucky was showing an incredible amount of trust by letting Tony do this. It would be the work of mere moments for Tony to turn him into a vegetable, fry his brain until recovery wasn’t even a possibility, and Steve wouldn’t even know what has happening until Bucky woke up. Tony wouldn’t, of course, but the weight of that trust sat heavy on his mind.

Six hours had passed before Tony had managed to get everything done he felt was necessary. There was a brand new socket housing unit embedded in Bucky’s shoulder, complete with detachable cover, that would take probably a week or two to heal with the serum, and all the wiring inside had been reworked to Tony’s satisfaction. He lowered the levels of the anesthesia to bring Bucky back around slowly. Steve’s hand grasped his shoulder and squeezed.

“Thank you, Tony,” he murmured, barely audible over the rushing in Tony’s ears and the panic clawing at his chest. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”

“Sure,” Tony grit out, forcing a smile he didn’t even come close to feeling. “Don’t mention it.”

.

Needless to say, the ex-Avengers had no intention of sticking around after the procedure. They’d gotten what they’d come for. Just two days after Bucky had woken up, they gathered in Tony’s living room once more. It was the first time Tony’d been in one room with all of them since their arrival. While his skin still crawled, he at least felt slightly more at ease than he had when they’d arrived. For one thing, he had what could almost be considered a friendship with Lang and Sam, which wasn’t something he’d been expecting at all. For another, Bucky was standing close to him, smiling at him fondly and making his chest feel all warm and tight.

“So, uh, I guess this is it, then.”

Steve stepped forward to offer his hand to shake.

“Thank you again for helping us. I know you really put yourself out on a limb.”

Tony shrugged and mustered up a self-deprecating smile.

“Well, for wanted fugitives, you guys weren’t the worst house guests I’ve ever had.”

Sam laughed and moved in for a hug that caught Tony entirely by surprise.

“I’m looking forward to seeing that new prosthetics line you talked about. Glad to know something good will come out of all of this. It’s hard to believe anything could, but your work is gonna help a lot of people.”

Tony’s belly flip-flopped and he struggled through the rest of the goodbyes, though Lang was the only other one who went for a hug. Bucky waved them on out until it was just the two of them left.

“I gotta admit, Tony,” he drawled, grinning, “you might just be the most incredible person I’ve ever met. I’m sorry our first meeting had to be the way it was.”

Tony chuckled.

“Yeah, well, if you visit again, I might suggest calling ahead instead of just showing up in my living room.”

The look Bucky gave him was long and examining.

“That’s not what I mean. I mean at the holding facility, and the airport, and Siberia. You never deserved any of that, and I’m sorry I’m the reason you had to go through it.”

Tony chest suddenly felt tight in a completely different way. He could feel himself trembling, and fear curled around his bones. He couldn’t find the words to respond, and Bucky must have realized that, since he kept right on talking.

“And, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry for Steve, too. I know you wanted to hear it from him and not me but… I think the real reason he hasn’t told you about your parents is because he’s scared. He just got me back, and the thought of losing me again… It’s no excuse, I know that. There isn’t anything anyone could say that could excuse the way you’ve been treated. I’m just so sorry, for all of it, and I wanted to make sure I told you that before we left. You deserve at least that much.”

Tony knew he should deny it, deny everything, but he could tell just by looking at Bucky’s face that it was too late. He’d figured it out. There was no going back.

“How did you know it was me?” he managed to choke out instead.

The look Bucky gave him could only be described as sympathetic.

“I’ve known since the first day we were here,” he admitted, “when I tried to tell you about your parents. You said you didn’t want to hear it _from me_. You already knew. You wanted the apology from Steve, because he’s the one who didn’t tell Iron Man. I-I never believed it was just a robot in that suit, you know. I always knew it was a person. It makes sense that it’s you.” His gaze drifted out after the others. “You know, I think you’re the only one among us who might actually be _good_ enough to really be a superhero.”

Tony gaped at him.

“I tried to kill you.”

Bucky snorted.

“You tried to incapacitate me. And Steve. You think I don’t know what the Iron Man armor is capable of? If you wanted me dead, I would be. For what it’s worth, I think you’re incredibly brave and kind to have let us into your home after what we did, to help me the way you have. You didn’t have to do any of that.”

“Yes,” Tony insisted. “I did. I hurt you, Bucky, and I never should have. What happened… HYDRA did that, not you. I was angry when I saw that video, but that doesn’t excuse my actions, either. I’m sorry, too.”

Bucky gave him a soft smile and stepped in closer.

“For what it’s worth,” he murmured, “I don’t think you have anything to apologize for.”

Then he leaned in and pressed his lips against Tony’s cheek.

“I hope I see Iron Man out there again soon,” he continued, as if he hadn’t just turned Tony’s entire world upside down. “The world needs him.”

Bucky turned to leave, like Tony was going to let him get away like that. The genius lurched forward, catching Bucky by the front of his shirt and hauling him in for a proper kiss. He relished the feeling of Bucky’s lips against his, pulled up in a grin.

“Iron Man isn’t the only one the world needs,” he informed Bucky brusquely. “I can’t do this alone.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Bucky agreed.

It didn’t fix things, not by a long shot. Hell, they had so much shit to get past, Tony wasn’t even sure that they’d be able to, but at least it was a start. Tony could work with that.


End file.
